The Home Education Register: What UK Parents Need to Know

The question of a compulsory home education register has defined the legislative debate around elective home education in England for the better part of a decade. It is no longer a hypothetical. The Children's Wellbeing and Schools Act 2026 created provisions for a mandatory Children Not in School register, but those provisions are not yet in force. Once commenced, local authorities in England will be required to establish and maintain registers and eligible parents will have information duties. Understanding what this register does — and what it does not do — is essential for any family educating at home.

What the Register Is

Once the new provisions are in force, the register will be a database maintained by each local authority recording eligible children of compulsory school age in their area who are not on the roll of a relevant school. The Act specifies information including the child's name, date of birth, home address or addresses, parents' names and addresses, who provides education, estimated time spent in education, and details of qualifying non-parent providers. The final practical forms and additional details depend on regulations and guidance.

Compulsory school age in England runs from the term following a child's fifth birthday until the last Friday in June of the school year in which they turn 16. Children outside this range — those not yet five, or those who have completed Year 11 — are not within the register's scope.

Importantly, the register is not an approval or licensing mechanism. Registration does not constitute the local authority endorsing or approving your home education arrangements. Once the new provisions commence, however, the local authority must consider the child's home and may request a home visit within 15 days of registration; a refusal must be considered when deciding whether to serve a preliminary notice for a School Attendance Order. The register does not itself require the National Curriculum.

Who Must Register

Once the new provisions are in force, if your child is of compulsory school age and is not enrolled in a relevant school, you will be required to notify the local authority and provide the information you hold so they can add the child to the register. The Act sets a 15-day period from the date the child becomes eligible, subject to the detailed commencement regulations. This applies whether you:

• Have actively deregistered from a school to educate at home
• Have never enrolled your child in school at all
• Are educated outside of a school under a dual registration or flexi-schooling arrangement where the school remains responsible for the child's enrolment

The Act also brings some flexi-school and part-time further-education cases within scope; exact exclusions and the practical forms will be set by regulations.

Wales does not currently have a compulsory Children Not in School register. The 2026 Act provides for registers in England and Wales, but those measures are not yet in force. Scottish and Northern Irish frameworks differ again. If you are not in England, the specific provisions applying to you will vary.

What Registration Does Not Mean

Several concerns circulate within home education communities about the register, some of which conflate registration with powers that do not exist. To be precise:

Registration does not create an approval requirement or a general duty to prove your provision continuously. Before the new provisions commence, local authorities continue to rely on their existing powers to make enquiries about suitability. Once commenced, the Act will add specific information duties and a power to request a home visit; those are not the same as automatic monitoring visits.

Registration does not require you to submit lesson plans, portfolios, or progress reports as a condition of remaining on the register. The Act does require specified information, including estimates of time spent in education and details of qualifying non-parent providers; regulations may set the practical forms and additional details. Lesson plans or portfolios may be relevant to a separate informal enquiry.

Registration does not mean your child must follow the National Curriculum or meet any particular academic benchmarks.

Your Existing Rights Are Unchanged

The Education Act 1996 continues to place the legal duty for securing a suitable education firmly on parents, not the state. Local authorities retain the power to make informal enquiries if they have reason to believe a child may not be receiving a suitable education, and to issue a School Attendance Order where they are not satisfied with the provision. The 2026 Act will add register, home-environment, and School Attendance Order provisions when its relevant measures come into force.

Education Otherwise, the leading UK charity advocating for home educators' rights, has published detailed guidance on how to respond to local authority enquiries in a way that is cooperative without conceding rights you do not have to concede. Their fact sheets are freely available and worth reading before any formal contact with your LA.

Practical Steps

If you have recently deregistered a child from school in England, the school must notify the local authority after deleting the child's name from its admission register under the current rules. This is not yet the new Children Not in School register duty. Once the new provisions commence, an eligible parent will have to provide the required information within 15 days of the child becoming eligible. You may also proactively contact your LA's home education team. Most councils now have a dedicated officer or small team responsible for this function.

When the LA does make contact, it is typically by letter, inviting you to share information about your educational approach. Responding with a brief, positive summary of your provision — the activities you engage in, the resources you use, the way you structure your week — can help explain your approach, but whether it answers the enquiry depends on the questions raised and the circumstances.

Building a documented picture of your child's social and extracurricular life is just as important as evidencing academic progress. The United Kingdom Socialization & Extracurricular Playbook provides planning templates, activity logs, and scheduling frameworks specifically designed to help you build and document a rich, varied programme — material that can help you explain your provision during an LA enquiry while also giving your child a genuinely full life outside a classroom.

The Broader Context

England recorded 175,900 children in elective home education at some point during the 2024/2025 academic year — a 15% increase from the previous year. With growth at this scale, the register is, at its core, an attempt by the state to maintain visibility over a population that has expanded far beyond what legacy administrative systems were designed to track.

The practical effect of the new system will depend on the regulations and implementation. The Act changes information duties and oversight processes when its relevant measures come into force; it does not itself require the National Curriculum or a school timetable.

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